


o brother, where art thou

by behradtarazi



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Bisexual Caitlin Snow, Bisexual Lisa Snart, F/F, Grief/Mourning, Kinda, Lisa Snart Loves Her Brother, Saints & Sinners (The Flash TV 2014), The Cold Gun (The Flash TV 2014), goldenfrost isn't the focus but god it is good, im just writing the lisa content the flash was too cowardly to give us rlly, lisa finds out that her brother is dead, takes place around flash s2 - beginning of s3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-21
Updated: 2019-08-21
Packaged: 2020-09-23 11:54:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20339689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/behradtarazi/pseuds/behradtarazi
Summary: lisa snart has lost a lot of things.and so, the universe says, what's one more?-in which lisa finds out that her brother died, and gets an unexpected source of comfort.





	o brother, where art thou

lisa snart has lost a lot of things.

her childhood innocence, her mother, her favorite pair of white-and-gold ice skates.

she’s used to it, by now. doesn’t get too attached, lives life fast and wild and never, ever looks back. she’s deadly and free and undefeated, and it doesn’t seem like she’ll ever slow down for anything or anything. she might just keep running for the rest of her life, strap on her skates and sling her gun over her shoulder and _ glide _.

then, mick visits her at the saints and sinners, with a heavy brown box and a blonde built like she was made for war, and lisa’s world grinds to a halt.

“your brother’s dead,” he tells her, gruff, pretending that she can’t see right through his strong facade. “sacrificed himself to save us.”

lisa looks at him over her drink, and it’s not clear if she doesn’t believe him or doesn’t want to. “bullshit,” she says, and her voice almost cracks. “lenny would never.”

the blonde’s blue eyes are unflinching sheets of ice as she pries the box from mick’s hands and almost slams it down on the bar in front of lisa. “he did.”

lisa doesn’t want to look at the box, can’t look at it, and so she turns her conflict into venom and sharpens her tongue and takes aim at the blonde, looks for chinks in her armor like she has to so many others so many times before. “you don’t know my brother,” she snaps, refusing to use past tense. “you-”

“lisa,” mick says, tired and empty in a way she’d only heard once before, on a cold night when he’d handed her a scorching flame and told her what it was like to watch his father burn. “don’t.”

she stares at him for a moment, incredulous and still spoiling for a fight, and he holds her gaze, steady and familiar, and she knows he’s not lying.

her brother is dead.

she doesn’t say another word, leaves her coat and that damned box behind.

she runs, because it’s the only thing she’s good at, the only thing she’s _ ever _ been good at, running and skating and trying to get out.

usually, it makes her feel free, but this time, though, this time, she feels like a mouse scrabbling at the walls of her cage, locked in and trapped and met at every side by some sharp reminder that he’s dead.

her brother is dead.

there’s a bank he once robbed, a painting blue like his eyes, an ice cream shop he’d taken her to - she knocks back a shot of vodka and feels it burn and hopes that for once it might do the trick and let her forget.

central city is a living, breathing memorial, a vibrant coffin, and she wants it _ gone _, because if it’s gone then he is too, just away from home, with those stupid fucking time traveling heroes or on a job, not dead.

when she finally finds her way back to her apartment, she sees her coat and the box there, and there’s a long, cold moment where she stands stock still, staring down at them and seeing red.

lisa kicks the box until it breaks, doesn’t stop until it’s in shambles, not even when a little voice in the back of her head warns her that she might be destroying one of the last things that she has of len. she leaves the shattered wood out in the hall, doesn’t look back when she slams the door shut and takes another shot and hopes that she’ll have one night, one grief-free night before it all starts to hurt and she goes numb, an unmovable statue.

but god knows that the universe has never given her what she’s asked for.

she dreams of fire melting ice and wishes that she still had the faith she did when she was a kid, when she watched her brother piece himself back together and climb to his feet and punch their father in the face and thought that he might as well be something damn near indestructible. 

she wakes up screaming, seeing light leave sharp blue eyes, and wraps a blanket around herself and sits on her couch, flicking a lighter on and off and watching the fire reflect on her favorite jewels until her heartbeat slows and she can breathe again. 

it would be easy to curse, to yell and rage and fight, and that’s what she always does - that’s what she’s_ expected _ to do.

she’s the golden glider - one of the menaces of central city - the woman who ruins lives and walks away laughing.

she doesn’t, though.

instead, lisa sits on her couch and breaks, breaks and breaks and breaks and breaks until she thinks that there is nothing left in her, and then she breaks some more.

a girl like her is never alone, but, god, she’s never felt more lonely than she does now, with no brother and no hope.

there’s no one to tell, though, and she learned early on that letting yourself be weak and hurt and vulnerable for long is good for nothing but signing your own death warrant, and lisa snart has been so many things in her life, has traded so many disguises and personalities, but at her core she will always be a survivor.

she will always run.

years ago, len had made her do research before one of their heists, and lisa remembers reading about kintsugi, the japanese art of repairing broken pottery with gold, and that’s what she does in the morning, gathering up the shards of her mind and gluing them into place and making them look pretty again, painting her lips gold and stepping out of her apartment, back straight and smirk wide like she hadn’t spent fifteen minutes staring numbly at a pack of swiss miss hot chocolate mix with the echo of len reviewing the marshmallow-to-chocolate ratio in a faux-snobbish voice ringing in her ears.

she goes shopping, then later to the saints and sinners, and she sits at the bar, a gold and marble statue - untouchable, unfeeling. she smiles a stunning smile at beautiful strangers, flirts and seduces, but the emotions all disappear once you get past the surface.

in another life, she thinks that she must have been an oscar-winning actress.

cold as ice comes on over the speakers, and she pretends that she doesn’t remember her brother at all, and maybe she doesn’t. maybe she’s been an only child all her life. yes, that sounds nice. lying’s easier than grieving.

when another woman sits down beside her, she turns, thankful for the distraction, then narrows her gaze and lets her smile grow deadly sharp when she recognizes her. “why, doc, i didn’t think you frequented this kind of place.”

caitlin snow smiles (slightly nervously, lisa is happy to note) back, clasping her hands in front of her. “hi, lisa. and i was looking for you, actually. the team needs help with some, uh...robbery, and we can’t seem to get in contact with the legends and your brother-”

“my brother’s dead,” lisa interrupts, and forces herself to get some kind of cruel satisfaction out of the surprise that washes over caitlin’s face. “what, didn’t mick and that blonde girl come tell you, too?”

she shakes her head, and lisa turns her attention back to her drink - and then caitlin puts a tentative hand on her shoulder, and lisa almost freezes up.

“i know we’re not exactly friends,” caitlin says, and lisa has to smile slightly at that, “but i’m here for you, if you’ll have me. i’ll even pay for drinks.”

she doesn’t say _ i’m sorry for your loss _ , doesn’t say _ that sounds horrible _ , doesn’t say _ i’m sure he died a hero _or some other bullshit, and lisa finds herself stupidly, overwhelmingly grateful for that.

all she says is _ i’m here. (you don’t have to be lonely anymore.) i’m here. _

the promise of alcohol also sounds lovely to lisa right now.

“i can’t say no to an offer like that,” she replies. “besides, it’ll be fun to see if you can keep up with me.”

she winks, and has to grin when she sees caitlin try not to turn red.

it turns out that caitlin most definitely cannot keep up, and she gives up before she ends up drunk and saying things she’d regret in the morning.

lisa laughs and calls her a lightweight, but caitlin just smiles, forgetting about why she came to get lisa in the first place and just...letting go, for once, relaxing and hoping that all of this somehow helps lisa feel better.

and it does, for awhile.

it does, because it’s running, avoiding thinking about her brother, and lisa’s good at that, so very good at that.

grief always catches up in the end, though, not that she’d admit it, and so somewhere between midnight and one in the morning, lisa turns to caitlin with a kind of breathtaking intensity and says, “come with me.”

caitlin hesitates, and then nods, lets lisa take her hand and lead her through the city, all the while thinking about how easy it would be to turn and run or grab her phone and call the flash, but she doesn’t make a move, just follows lisa.

they end up at lisa’s apartment, and caitlin frowns slightly when she sees the pile of demolished wood in front of her door. “what…?”

lisa leans down, and picks up the cold gun with hands that _ don’t tremble, no, she doesn’t let them tremble, can’t be weak, not now. _

she pretends that caitlin does not look almost afraid when she straightens back up, and then she does the unthinkable - she offers her the gun, the sleek metal glinting in the light.

“are you - giving that to me?”

lisa nods, makes herself smile wryly. “not much use to anyone now, is it? i won’t help your team. not a hero, never will be. but you can have that. just get it out of my sight.”

caitlin takes the gun (maybe even takes her heart, too), and then gives her a small rectangular piece of paper in return.

“it’s my number,” she says, when she sees lisa’s inquisitive eyes. “on a business card, actually. i’ve never had much occasion to give one to someone before. just...call me soon, maybe? we can get more drinks.”

lisa stares at the paper for another long moment, and then tucks it into the back of her pocket, blows caitlin a kiss, and walks inside her apartment, locking the door behind her.

she just gave another piece of her brother to the good guys.

good.

when she was little, lenny had had to leave her alone with their father while he did a job, and he’d sworn to her that he would come back to her, that he would _ always _come back to her.

And he’ll have to come back now, won’t he? come back from wherever he’s hiding, no matter how far, to get that gun back. he has to come back to central.

back to her. 

(he has always been a liar, though, just like she’s always been a runner.

he’s always been a liar, and so she keeps caitlin’s card.

just in case.

she doesn’t want to be lonely.)


End file.
